International Commission of Jurists
ICJ submission to the Universal Periodic Review of Lebanon

ICJ submission to the Universal Periodic Review of Lebanon

Jul 9, 2020 | Advocacy, Non-legal submissions

The ICJ filed a submission to the Human Rights Council’s Working Group on the Universal Periodic Review in advance of its review of Lebanon’s human rights record between January and February 2021.

Information provided in the submission was based on a number of recent ICJ publications, including on the independence of the judiciary; military courts; gender-based violence; and a forthcoming publication on the human rights of refugees and migrants in Lebanon.

In the submission, the ICJ drew the attention of the Working Group to the following concerns with respect to Lebanon:

  • The independence of the judiciary and the use and jurisdiction of military courts;
  • The obstacles that continue to impede women’s and girls’ access to justice for sexual and gender-based violence (SGBV); and
  • The inadequate framework and practices undermining migrants’ and refugees’ rights.

The ICJ called on the Working Group and Human Rights Council to urge the Lebanese authorities to take the following actions:

With regard to the independence of the judiciary and the use and jurisdiction of military courts:

  1. End executive control and undue influence over the judiciary, including by divesting the Minister of Justice of any role in the selection, appointment, promotion, transfer, secondment or any other aspects of the management of the career of judges;
  2. Ensure that the High Judicial Council is independent from the executive, including by amending its composition to ensure that the majority of members are judges elected by their peers, and that it is pluralistic, gender and minority representative, competent to decide on all issues relating to the career of judges, and empowered to uphold the independence of the judiciary;
  3. Ensure that military courts have no jurisdiction to try civilians, and that such jurisdiction is restricted to military personnel over alleged breaches of military discipline or ordinary crimes not involving the commission of human rights violations, to the exclusion of human rights violations and crimes under international law.

With regard to women’s access to justice for SGBV:

  1. Repeal all discriminatory provisions against women, particularly those in the Criminal Code, the Nationality Code and Personal Status Laws;
  2. Adopt a unified civil Personal Status Law for all religious groups, where all customs discriminating against women and girls are overridden in accordance with article 2(f) of CEDAW; and ensure that issues related to divorce, inheritance and custody are adjudicated before ordinary courts consistent with international standards;
  3. Amend Law No. 293/2014 on the protection of women and other family members from domestic violence (Law No. 293/14) and the Criminal Code to ensure that it criminalizes all forms of SGBV, including by properly defining rape as a type of sexual assault characterized by a physical invasion of a sexual nature without consent or under coercive circumstances, and ensure that marital and all other acts of rape be criminalized; and, to this end, abolish provisions of Law No. 293/14 providing for a religion-based claim to marital rights;
  4. Amend the Criminal Code, the Code of Criminal Procedure and Law No. 293/14 to include gender-sensitive investigations and evidence-gathering procedures in order to enable women to report violence against them, and take effective steps to address the social and practical factors that continue to impede women’s access to justice, such as gender-based stereotypes and prejudices that operate in society and in the justice system;
  5. Remove obstacles related to gender stereotypes, economic and social realities that continue to impede access to justice in SGBV cases, including by ensuring that where law enforcement officers fail to ensure an effective investigation into an incident of SGBV, their omissions be actionable as a breach of their duties and subject to disciplinary measures as appropriate;
  6. Provide routine capacity building training to justice sector actors on the application of international human rights law, including CEDAW and related jurisprudence.

With regard to the treatment of refugees and migrants:

  1. Become a party to the 1951 UN Refugee Convention and its 1967 Protocol, and pass legislation to adequately protect the human rights of refugees, asylum seekers, stateless people and migrants, in compliance with Lebanon’s international obligations;
  2. Amend the 1962 Law on the Entry, Stay in and Exit from Lebanon (Law 1962) to ensure full compliance with these obligations, and that people entitled to international protection, chiefly refugees, asylum seekers, and stateless individuals, are not penalized, automatically arrested or deported for their “illegal” entry and stay in the country;
  3. Ensure that no individual is deprived of their liberty solely on the grounds of their immigration status, and, to this end, amend articles 32 and 36 of Law 1962; until then, provide automatic, periodic judicial review of the lawfulness, necessity and proportionality of any immigration-related detention;
  4. Strictly comply with Lebanon’s non-refoulement obligations, including by ensuring that no individual is transferred to a country where they face a real risk of persecution or other forms of serious harm; that nobody is forcibly returned without an individualized, fair and effective procedure guaranteeing due process; and by establishing a moratorium on all removals to Syria.

Lebanon-UPR Submission-Advocacy-Non Legal submission-2020-ENG (full submission, in PDF)

 

Libya: ICJ welcomes effort to establish UN Fact-Finding Mission

Libya: ICJ welcomes effort to establish UN Fact-Finding Mission

Jun 18, 2020 | Advocacy, Non-legal submissions

At the UN Human Rights Council, the ICJ today welcomed a pending resolution that would create an international Fact-Finding Mission on Libya.

The statement read as follows:

“The International Commission of Jurists welcomes the oral update by the High Commissioner for Human Rights on the situation in Libya.

The ICJ is seriously concerned by the escalation of conflict in Libya and the increasing number of violations and abuses of international law including unlawful killings and attacks on civilian objects committed since this session was suspended in March. Just last week, at least eight mass graves were found, mainly in Tarhuna, in which the bodies of women and children were found.

The ICJ welcomes the High Commissioner’s recommendation that the Human Rights Council establish an international investigative body and calls on the Council to adopt the resolution tabled by Libya establishing a Fact-Finding Mission to investigate and preserve evidence of violations of international human rights law and international humanitarian law committed by all parties in Libya.[1] The ICJ calls on States to ensure the Fact-Finding Mission has at least one full year to complete its work.

As the Berlin Conference conclusions stressed,[2] accountability for gross human rights violations must be a key component of the political process in Libya. States must increase efforts to guarantee accountability remains front and centre in all negotiations on the future of Libya and provide full support including cooperation and resources to the Fact-Finding Mission for Libya once established.”

[1] A/HRC/43/L.40.

[2] https://www.bundesregierung.de/breg-de/aktuelles/the-berlin-conference-on-libya-1713868.

ICJ webinar highlights difficulties in responding to gender based violence during the Covid-19 pandemic

ICJ webinar highlights difficulties in responding to gender based violence during the Covid-19 pandemic

Jun 2, 2020 | Advocacy, News

At a webinar hosted on 26 May, the ICJ heard from women human rights defenders (WHRDs) from Asia, Africa, and the Middle East discussed the adverse impact on women of lockdowns and other measures imposed by governments around the world as a response to the COVID-19 pandemic.

Reports from around the world indicate a rise in the number of cases of domestic violence and new challenges faced by women victims in accessing justice.

“Support or assistance for women experiencing domestic violence was not classified as an essential service that may continue when the country went on lockdown,” said Nonhlanhla Dlamini who is the Director of Swaziland Action Group Against Abuse (SWAGAA) in Eswatini. Still, SWAGAA and other NGOs in Eswatini persisted in their work to lobby the government to classify their work as an essential service.  The government later provided authorization to allow SWAGAA’s staff to move more freely in order to assist women experiencing gender-based violence during the lockdown.

Theresia Iswarini, Commissioner of Indonesia’s National Commission on Violence Against Women (KOMNAS Perempuan), observed that because of the limited movement during the lockdown, NGOs are having a hard time reaching women experiencing domestic violence who do not have phones or any devices to access the internet.

NGOs also face the challenge of placing these women in safehouses because they need to first present a certificate that they are COVID-free before they are accepted in the safehouse and such certificates are almost impossible to secure during the pandemic.

The WHRDs assisting women experiencing gender-based violence often also need psychosocial support, as  “they also have to deal with the additional burdens of overseeing the homeschooling of their children and caring for family members who may have also fallen ill.”

In Sri Lanka, Mariam Dawood who is the Legal Adviser from Women in Need (WIN), noted that “women in Sri Lanka have always faced this problem and [of being] ignored when they report gender-based violence to police authorities.”

She also shared that while courts had started to operate on a limited basis in the country, women in maintenance cases risk being exposed to infection because they have to appear in court at least every month to get an order from the judge to compel their spouses to pay alimony or child support.

These orders were not automatically renewable and must be obtained by women every month from the court.

ICJ Commissioner and Member of the UN Committee on the Elimination of Discrimination against Women Nahla Haidar asked participants to think about how civil society could mobilize other stakeholders in pandemics to give an ethical call on how behaviors can change at home.

“Who is responsible? We have been trying to speak to faith leaders, especially women faith leaders [in the MENA region]. I am wondering how these channels can be used, as well as within traditional leadership channels in Africa,” Haidar said.

ICJ Senior Legal Adviser, Emerlynne Gil, noted that many of the issues raised showed that even during the pandemic, governments reproduced patriarchal approaches to public polices which effectively saw women as subordinate to men.

“This inequality underlines many of the actions taken by governments around the world to curb the pandemic,” said Emerlynne Gil. She added: “This means that it is all the more important for groups like the ICJ to continue its work eliminating gender stereotypes and discriminatory practices in the work of justice actors around the world.”

During the webinar, the ICJ launched an animation calling on States to adopt gender-sensitive responses to the COVID-19 pandemic. Watch the animation here:

The webinar was live streamed on ICJ Asia’s facebook. Watch the livestream here:

COVID-19: urgent measures must be taken by MENA governments to protect the prison population

COVID-19: urgent measures must be taken by MENA governments to protect the prison population

Mar 24, 2020 | Advocacy, Non-legal submissions

In light of the global COVID-19 pandemic outbreak—qualified as a Public Health Emergency of International Concern by the World Health Organization (WHO)—the ICJ, together with 39 other organizations, today expressed grave concern over the situation of detainees and prisoners across the Middle East and North Africa (MENA) and called on governments in the MENA region to:

  1. Make known to the public their country-specific, and if relevant, facility-specific policies and guidelines in place to prevent the spread of COVID-19 in detention centers, prisons, and police stations.
  2. Share their emergency preparedness plans and provide specific training to relevant staff and authorities to ensure sufficient and sustained access to healthcare and hygiene provision.
  3. Conduct a thorough review of the prison population and in turn, reduce their prison populations by ordering the immediate release of:
    1. “Low-risk” detainees and prisoners, including those convicted or held in pretrial detention (remand) for nonviolent offences; administrative detainees; and those whose continued detention is not justified;
    2. Detainees and prisoners particularly vulnerable to the virus, including the elderly, and individuals with serious underlying conditions including lung disease, heart disease, diabetes, and autoimmune diseases.
  1. Allow individuals serving probation and probationary measures to fulfill their probation and probationary measures in their homes.
  2. Guarantee that individuals who remain in detention:
    1. Have their right to health effectively upheld by being granted full access to medical care as required;
    2. Access COVID-19 testing and treatment on a standard equal to that governing the general population;
    3. Are provided with means of communication and opportunities to access the outside world when in-person visits are suspended;
    4. Continue to enjoy their right to due process, including but not limited to the right to challenge the lawfulness of their detention, and their right not to experience delays that would render their detention arbitrary.

Full English language joint statement (in PDF): MENA-Covid-19-Prisons-Advocacy-2020-ENG

Full Arabic language joint statement (in PDF): MENA-Covid-19-Prisons-Advocacy-2020-ARA

 

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